President Javier Milei will hold a bilateral meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi this Saturday morning at Casa Rosada. This will be the second meeting between the two, following the one they held at the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. 

While Modi has been to Argentina before for the G20 Summit in Buenos Aires in 2018, this is his first official bilateral trip to the country. 

A joint statement by the Argentine Oil Industry Chamber (CIARA) and the Cereal Export Center (CEC) described Modi’s visit as “extremely important,” and highlighted the need to increase Argentina’s commercial ties with the Asian country.

Argentina’s trade with India has resulted in more than US$1 billion surplus for Argentina in the first quarter of 2025, according to a National Institute of Statistics and Census (INDEC) report on Argentine Commercial Trade. The surplus mostly comes from soybean oil, which accounts for 95% of Argentina’s exports to India. Sunflower oil exports are also growing strongly.

“We supply the oil Indian consumers use every day, and we have the potential to continue increasing our supply. To achieve this, we need the Argentine government to strengthen bilateral economic, commercial, and cultural ties and promote them within Mercosur, to quickly open negotiations for a free trade agreement with India,” read the joint statement. 

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“This agreement would allow us tariff-free and restriction-free access to the Indian market for all food and products derived from the various food chains, and allow India to provide the best technology to our market.”

The Mercosur summit was held last Thursday in Buenos Aires, where Argentina transferred the pro tempore presidency of the South American bloc to Brazil. 

Earlier this year, India and Argentina held the first meeting of their Joint Working Group on Mineral Resources in Buenos Aires. India’s Secretary of the Ministry of Mines Kantha Rao, who chaired the Indian delegation, mentioned at the time the country’s top mineral imports — coal, copper, phosphorus, and magnesium — as well as India’s need to “diversify its suppliers and identify markets where it can obtain critical minerals that the country lacks and that contribute to its national security, such as lithium.”

At the end of the meeting the two delegations agreed to create two working subgroups: one for cooperation in exploration and the other for investment, as well as a second meeting of the Joint Working Group to be held in the first quarter of 2026 in New Delhi.

With information from Ámbito